Breeding corys?

[Mazonic]

hey

I have a 3 foot tank that i want to setup to breed some sort of corys.

Could some recommend a species easy to breed ? and the required set up e.g. lighting, temp , substrate , plants and any other thing important to breed corys?

cheers

Mason

[alanmin4304]

The easiest way is to keep them in a bare tank with a plastic plant and when they lay the eggs on the plant you take them out and hatch them in another tank.Another is to put the breeders in a bare tank and when they lay their eggs on the glass take the breeders out and put them in the next tank.

[Simian]

A important question..

Are you wanting to breed out of interest, for making money or to build a nice big colony

Answering that question will determine which type of cory you try and breed

The easiest and most prolific would be Bronze cories closely followed by Peppered

Great fun and very rewarding to see hundreds of babies growing out, not a great $$ return per fish though as it is very easy to saturate the market.

If you are new to breeding start with them and get raising them to saleable size perfected (8 weeks from free swimming should see them at 2-3cm)

Then sell off what you have and invest in a trickier species

As for size tanks, it depends on the species and the size of your group a little, IMO I'd stick with a 2 footer as a minimum

[Mazonic]

I have breed other fish before and kept marine so was looking at some trickier species.

Would like to try breed Panda or sterba's???

are these very hard to breed ???

[alanmin4304]

I found pandas easier than sterbais but other people might find them the same or other way around. Pandas were going well for me until The shakes put a stop to things. I have bred bronze, albino (which are usually from bronze), peppers,and pandas and found them reasonably easy. Not so much ease with sterbais but I know other people who find them easy.

I used to spawn them in a bare tank before adding other fry and they act as very good cleaners of excess food.

[Simian]

Good choices, they will sell well and not too hard to breed.

I have had better fertility results with a very high tannin content in my water, Leaf litter bottom supplies that, blocks filters fast though so consider a screen before the intake if you go down that path. :facepalm:

Most cory species I have bred have tended to spawn close to the outlet of my filters. Use some spawning mops or fake plants to collect the eggs, try different types and at different heights in the water column, your group will soon decide what they like best.

Choose young healthy fish, don't be tempted to get that old big fat girl that looks like she's ready to drop a ton of eggs, I recently learnt that fish about 1-2 years old produce the most eggs and those big old girls you sometimes see are probably past their best

Have about a 3:1 or even higher ratio of males to females to get really good fertility results.

Don't fill the tank too high, except when you are simulating monsoon conditions.

The temperature will need to be fiddled with and recorded if you want to get good spawns, most cories like cooler water 23deg average IMO some even like it as low as 20.

Condition with live food (white worms) blood worm's will do the trick too and keep the water changes up.

I am breeding some cories that are chronic at eating their eggs and young (large group about 15-20 adults) in a 4 footer with those basic principals and usually get a spawn every few days, I only get time to look after them once a day so I don't get to save all my eggs but have almost got this setup sorted, raising the fry can be the hard bit, especially if your chosen cory has very small eggs, the fry seem very fragile and are difficult to feed if you dont have much time.

HTH Owen

[Simian]

I found pandas easier than sterbais but other people might find them the same or other way around. Pandas were going well for me until The shakes put a stop to things. I have bred bronze, albino (which are usually from bronze), peppers,and pandas and found them reasonably easy. Not so much ease with sterbais but I know other people who find them easy.

I used to spawn them in a bare tank before adding other fry and they act as very good cleaners of excess food.

I have talked to quite a few breeders about Sterbai's, there appears to be some fertility issues with Sterbais, I had no luck for ages, introduced some fresh young males and increased tannin content of water, much better now.

[Mazonic]

would you be able to keep ether pandas or sterabi with cockatoos ???

i a four foot or would they have to be in different tanks?

cheers

[Simian]

They will be fine together, just expect some predation of eggs and fry